A Collision of Worlds

Luke 2:1-20

December 23/24, 2012 • Portage First UMC

He was tired. Oh, so tired. There was a reason no one made this journey frequently or even all that willingly, and he had made it too often in the last few months. Up to Nazareth, now back to Bethlehem. And this time he had been forced to come. The government. Always the government. Why do a census now? He supposed there wasn’t really any good time to do a census, but for he and his betrothed, there couldn’t have been a worse time.

Augh! There it was again—her cry of pain. Every time she cried out, it cut him like a knife. He loved her so much, and when he had found out she was pregnant, it had nearly killed him. This was not the life he had planned on. This was not the start to their marriage he had dreamed of. He had wanted to walk away from it all, until the night the angel came. “Jesus,” the angel said. “You shall call him Jesus.” It wasn’t an unusual name. There were many boys he knew named Jesus. But the angel had said this Jesus had a special calling. “He will save his people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21). Could it be? Could the time have finally arrived? All of the promises he had learned as a young boy, all of the hopes his people had for so long, all of the anticipation that was a part of their faith—could it be that now was the time? Was this boy going to be the one?

There was her cry again. They were getting closer together. He tried to remember what the family midwife had told him back in Nazareth, about how the closer the cries get, the sooner she would deliver. He’d better hurry up and find them a place to stay. His family lived just around the corner. It would be a full house because of the census, but maybe they would have room for the two of them. Oops, he meant the three of them.

Not far away, one of the young men around the fire turned his gaze toward the nearby town of Bethlehem. He and his friends weren’t really welcome there. They were country folk. Common laborers. Sheep herders. They weren’t trusted to tell the truth. In fact, the rabbis had banned them from being witnesses in any court case (Card, Luke: The Gospel of Amazement, pg. 48). Well, that was all right with him. Odd that they could be trusted to raise sheep who would be perfect enough to be used as sacrifices at the temple, but they were shut out of that worship most of the time. Still, it wasn’t a bad life. He had a home, friends, enough food to get by. And most of the time, they didn’t have to work late. But this was lambing season, and you never knew when the babies were going to be born. They took turns staying awake, living out in the fields, just in case a mother went into labor. They needed to be nearby in case she got in trouble. He turned his attention back to the fire. The others were laughing at a good joke his brother had told, that he had missed. Oh, well, he had probably heard it before anyway, so he smiled and acted as if he’d heard it.

Just a little further away, sleep eluded the most powerful man in that region. They called him “king” though he had not really earned the title. And he knew that. It gnawed at him every day. He paced the roof of the palace that night. Something was not right. Something was different in the air, though he had no idea what. Was there something he had done that was bothering him? No, probably not. Herod didn’t feel guilt, not like most people did. What he felt most often was paranoia. He knew he wasn’t really king, and he lived in constant fear that someone else was going to take his throne from him. On this dark night, he couldn’t help but remember the day he had his favorite wife executed because he was sure she was trying to take the throne from him. He had her mother killed, too. And three of his sons. They were after his power as well (Hamilton, The Journey, pg. 123). He was sure of it. And, even as he remembered the death of each of them, he didn’t feel sad or guilty. He felt somewhat satisfied. He had prevented them from overthrowing him. So what was it about tonight? What was bothering him?

The dinner conversation. Yes, that was it. He regularly used dinner as time to catch up on the gossip of the kingdom. He wanted to make sure he knew what was going on. The last thing he wanted was for some news to get back to Caesar and him not know about it. So he’d asked, as he always did, what his advisors were hearing out in the streets. Well, they said, there’s a whole lot of chatter these days about a coming Messiah. Herod wasn’t a practicing Jew (which was part of the problem), but he knew the prophecies. He knew the people expected the coming of a great king, one who comes from God and will rule over all. They expected a military power, someone who would destroy both Herod and Rome. Any idea why they are talking about it now? Herod had asked. No, his advisors said. Just seems to be something in the air. Something in the air. And it had Herod bothered. When people began anticipating something, especially something as meaningful and potentially disastrous as the coming of the Messiah, they very often could find a way to make it happen. Something was in the air, all right, and pretty soon, Herod would have to decide what to do about it. He’d have to do something. He’d have to prove he’s still in charge. He chuckled quietly to himself. I guess, he thought, sleep is not in my future tonight.

“What do you mean there’s no place to sleep?” he yelled, and then he heard Mary cry out again. “Can’t you see what shape she is in? We’ll take anything, just make sure it has a little privacy. She’s going to be having that baby any minute!” And so they let him in, gave Joseph and Mary a little bit of food while the children prepared a place for them to bed down for the night in the stable area. It was closed off, partially, from the rest of the house, but close enough that older female relatives could help, if needed, when the baby came. As Joseph guided Mary into their place of rest, he looked around. He remembered this stable. As a boy, he had played here and he had worked here. Now Mary’s son—the child the angel told him to raise, to be father to—was going to begin his life here. Mary cried out again as Joseph eased her onto the straw. “Just rest,” he told her. She gave him a look that seemed to say, “When you’re pregnant and minutes from giving birth, then you can start giving advice!” But she didn’t say the words. With family nearby, with a warm place for them to sleep, if they were able to sleep, Joseph finally relaxed, just a bit. There was nothing else for him to do but wait—wait for this baby, this miracle baby, to be born. Then the real work began. How in the world was he going to be a father to the son of God?

The fire was burning low, and many of them had already drifted off to sleep. So far, tonight, there hadn’t been any births. He continued to stoke the fire. He had said he would take the first shift because he really wasn’t all that tired. So he sat quietly, alone with his thoughts, and poked the fire with a stick. Wait—did the fire just get brighter? No, no, the light is coming from—behind him? How is that possible? Slowly, he turned around, and there stood—well, it was an angel. If you were to ask him later how he knew, he would tell you he just knew. It was an angel, no doubt about it. He looked like an angel, he glowed like an angel—he even smelled like an angel,  he smelled like holiness (cf. Michael Card). How did he know? Again, he just knew. “Fear not,” the angel said—which, if he remembered his Scriptures right, was what an angel always said. “Uh, guys,” he said, not looking away from the angel, but poking those around him. “Guys, you might want to wake up for this.” Thomas, closest to him, sort of opened one eye and grouchily said, “What is it?” Thomas was almost always grouchy, or at least that’s the way he wanted to appear. But when he saw the angel, even Thomas got quiet. One by one, the other shepherds woke up only to stare at this man who came from another place. “Fear not,” he said again, “I’m bringing you good news. Over there, in David’s town, a baby has been born. And it’s not just any ordinary baby. This baby is the Messiah, the one you have anticipated for so long.”

Messiah? In Bethlehem? Well, it sort of made sense. Bethlehem was where the greatest king in their history had come from. But, seriously, Bethlehem? Before they could ask questions, before they could wonder why this angel was bothering to tell them, the lowest of the low, the bottom rung on the social ladder, true outcasts, the sky literally exploded with angels. Oh, and the song they were singing was—well, beautiful didn’t begin to describe it. It was unbelievable. It was like—well, it was like heaven had waited for so long to sing this song, to announce this new birth, that, just like proud parents, they couldn’t sing it loud enough. (And yet, you know, the most amazing thing is, when he asked around later, no one else seemed to have heard the song. He assumed people from Ein Karem to Bethlehem to Jerusalem would have heard it, but he never found another single soul who had. Just them. Just lowly shepherds.)

Once the angel song was done, they sort of stood there staring at each other. One of the older shepherds suggested they head right away over to Bethlehem to find the baby, to see this one they had anticipated. “But what about the sheep?” he asked. “Who’ll watch the sheep?” Thomas, back to his grouchy self, snarled, “Forget the stupid sheep. This is more important than they are. Besides, they won’t go far.” He stood there for a moment, looking at the sheep, then watching his fellow shepherds head off toward the town. He looked back and forth for a few minutes. What should he do?

It was quiet now. Somehow, he made it through the birth. Mary was, quite simply, amazing, and now she was feeding this newborn child. She was exhausted, weary from the trip and even moreso from the birth, but that didn’t stop her from cuddling and cooing with this child whom she had anticipated for the last nine months. He was finally here, and when his family had asked, Joseph had done as the angel instructed. “His name is Jesus.” “Jesus?” he had overheard one of them say. “Such a common name.” Joseph smiled at the thought. Someday, they would find out this baby was anything but common. Son of Mary, Son of Joseph...Son of God. Could it be? Could this baby, nuzzled close to his beloved Mary, really be the Son of God? Could he really be the Messiah, the one who had come to save the people from their sins? Could it be?

He looks so—small. He doesn’t look like a Messiah. Joseph thought about all the rabbis he had heard teaching during his life who pictured the Messiah as someone coming on a white horse, a military man, someone to overthrow Herod and the Romans. Maybe he’d have to teach this boy how to ride a horse. Or maybe God had something different in mind. Could it be? Could this baby, this little tiny baby, be the one who would save the world? Could he really be the one they had anticipated for so long? What was God up to anyway? Well, those questions would be answered another day. Tonight, he needed sleep. He really needed sleep. Especially if he was going to raise the Son of God! As he drifted off to sleep, Joseph prayed for Mary and for the baby boy. And before he knew it, he was gently snoring there in the midst of the stable hay.

The prophet Isaiah speaks: “In the wilderness prepare the way for the Lord; make straight in the desert a highway for our God” (40:3). “Prepare for what? A collision of worlds. Like a meteor falling to the earth, heaven was bearing down on the land of his forefathers. An old promise, so old that it had become little more than a legend, was about to be fulfilled—and nothing would ever be the same. The Messiah was coming” (Ramsey, Behold the Lamb of God, Chapter 1). Tonight, we celebrate that the Messiah has come.